Calif. headstones marked with N-word replaced

SACRAMENTO, Calif. 
Workers have begun installing new markers at a Northern California cemetery where relocated Gold Rush-era gravestones were marked with the N-word.

California prison inmates who are part of a work program on Tuesday were placing granite headstones on many of the 36 graves at the Mormon Island Relocation Cemetery near Sacramento.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers relocated the graves from a site a few miles away known as Negro Hill to build Folsom Dam in 1954. The N-word was chiseled into the new markers, leading an activist to request that they be replaced.

The new stones say "Unknown. Moved from Negro Hill Cemetery by U.S. Government, 1954."

El Dorado County supervisors voted in May to replace the offensive gravestones for $18,000. California Prison Industry Authority spokesman Eric Reslock says the work should be finished Wednesday.